Alternative War: Unabridged

by J. J. Patrick

  RT has intensified its efforts, dominating social media with an almost viral level of spread – the specific risk STRATCOM is trying to address. Nonetheless, RT has been highly successful at infiltrating and driving its narratives across the Western world. The United States provides one very good example of their achievements and, in her interview with pro-Kremlin journalist Sergey Minaev, Simonyan complimented RT staff in the United States for passionately defending Russian positions on the air and in social media. “I wish you could see...how these guys, not just on air, but on their own social networks, Twitter, and when giving interviews, how they defend the positions that we stand on!” she said.

  From the introduction of Capstone to the EU joint initiatives, it is clear the Alternative War had already been a live, covert conflict for at least two years before Trump and Brexit began to be unpicked, despite all the main warning signs being in plain sight. However, what was probably the biggest weapon in the conflict took everyone by surprise. The crucial element of the hybrid assault deployed by Russia – notable by its failure to achieve the desired political manipulation in France due to the government responses and, equally by its success in the UK with Brexit and US with Trump – was the relatively new and still misunderstood technique of psychometrics or psychographics. Now infamously deployed by American company Cambridge Analytica – part of the British SCL Group – in both the Trump campaign and Leave.EU’s Brexit campaign, psychometrics (to stick to one term for ease) utilises so-called Big Data, gathered through social media, surveys and other databases, to create a unique personal profile on every voter. A singular assessment of a person and their personality, to which messages can be tailored and targeted. It is a psychological warfare technique and Cambridge Analytica, through ex-board member and special adviser to Trump, Steve Bannon, is believed to be making attempts to woo the Pentagon, with representatives just “dropping by” according to various reports.31

  Another company in the same market is Palantir Technologies32, already linked to the US Department of Defense. One of their systems, Gotham, is used by counter-terrorism analysts at offices in the United States Intelligence Community and United States Department of Defense, fraud investigators at the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, and cyber analysts at Information Warfare Monitor. Going back as far as 2013, additional clients of Palantir included Homeland Security, the NSA, the FBI, the Center for Disease Control, the Marine Corps, the Air Force, Special Operations Command, West Point, the Joint IED-defeat organisation and others. According to reporters at Tech Crunch, “The US spy agencies also employed Palantir to connect databases across departments. Before this, most of the databases used by the CIA and FBI were siloed, forcing users to search each database individually. Now everything is linked together using Palantir.” US military intelligence also deployed the Palantir product to improve their ability to predict the locations of improvised explosive devices in its war in Afghanistan. The technology was deployed with Marines in 2011 and practitioners reported it to be more useful than the United States Army's in-house Distributed Common Ground System.

  By 2015, Palantir’s relationships with both the CIA and the NSA had soured to the point where both parted company with the private company, which was founded by billionaire Peter Thiel. One key observation coming out of the resultant spat highlighted the big data method is significantly more successful where it is deployed in a human intelligence environment, rather than signals intelligence – hence only limited success in the NSA integration. Largely, this goes a long way to explaining how the technology has become so instrumental in the hybrid conflict. Until it became widely known in 2017, however, the technique of harnessing enhanced datasets had been identified and perceived as a risk for a number of years.

  Back in 2010, cyber security company HB Gary – who also worked on Federal contracts – were in friendly talks about integrating with Palantir on social media based products. Under the subject heading “Social Media, Exploitation, and Persistent Internet Operations,” senior employees of both companies were discussing the opportunities and risks by email.

  “The rise of the social web has created an entirely new set of useful technologies and security vulnerabilities. It is our experience that most individuals and organisations understand there are risks to using social media but don't understand the full extent, from what types of use, what the real risks are, or how the vulnerabilities can be fully exploited,” one exchange said.

  The emails were dumped on the internet by Wikileaks33 after one HB Gary employee exposed alleged members of Anonymous to the authorities in 2011, in an event which ruined his career. Before infamy, however, Arron Barr set out in further emails just how significant the development of big data as a weapon would be. “There is an immense amount of information that can be aggregated from social media services to develop competitive intelligence against any target. Take any US defence contractor. If I could harvest a significant amount of data from sites such as FBO, Monster, LinkedIn, Input, Facebook, Twitter. What type of picture could I put together as far as company capabilities, future plans, contract wins, etc. From a targeting perspective could I identify information exposure points that lead to a defensive weakness…I spoke to INSCOM a few weeks ago about their desire to start to incorporate more social media reconnaissance and exploitation into their red team efforts. Such a capability has a broad applicability that will be more significantly needed in the future,” he wrote.

  Barr was years ahead of his time in identifying threats which were subsequently exploited to successfully manipulate both British and American electorates. In one briefing email, he expanded, saying: “The explosive growth of social media has created a highly effective channel for the collection and aggregation of personal and organisational information for the purposes of tailoring content for users. To interact in a social media ecosystem requires some release of personally identifiable information (PII), in fact with most services the more information you provide the more tailored and beneficial the experience. In most cases, these are legitimate reasons for providing the information with tangible user benefits, whether it be to more personalise and localise advertising or tailored and real-time information delivery that increases personal productivity. Unfortunately, the same methods are being used to conduct information reconnaissance and exploitation. The most common current examples are spear-phishing attacks.”

  “Future social media exploitation tactics will likely be applications and service that provide personal benefit or entertainment, but serving a dual purpose to collect information that can be used for more insidious purposes. This marks a new class of exploitation, vehicles directly targeting people rather than the machines they use,” he concluded, in an eerie portent.

  HB Gary no longer exists as it was and Barr is now a recluse, nonetheless, what they identified many years ago was not only visionary but has become part of the Russian hybrid arsenal, not only by direct use of psychometrics as a weapon but also via one of their third-party hacking and disinformation channels, Wikileaks. I tracked down one former employee of HB Gary and asked them how dangerous social media really was and if it had really had been turned into a weapon. “The Russian stuff kinda proves that out right?” they replied, without prompting.

  “There is enough info and interaction purely in the public domain to provide intelligence and to engage in influence. Social media is the perfect mechanism. But we can see that happening right in front of us. Just have to organise and automate,” they added.

  In the Wikileaks dumps on HB Gary there were a number of mentions about defence from the weaponised use of this data, but nothing concrete. When I asked, the response they gave me was, again, fairly stark. “There isn't really a defence. Not one that can be easily devised. Platforms are of course working to manage fake info but that only will take care of the careless and less sophisticated – if done properly. [It’s] taking advantage of people's natural inclinations... but again we can see all this in front of us.”


  I pressed them on Cambridge Analytica and what they knew through the industry grapevine, but the answer confirmed a lot of the rumours about the company’s high commitment to secrecy. “I haven't heard anything...there are people that obviously have the background and talent and are now, and increasingly, going to apply it in the wild. The question is not “is developing the capabilities unethical?” It's what do you do with it.”

  The arms value of social media-led psychometrics combined with traditional disinformation has changed everything and the damage caused by the hybrid conflict to date, it seems clear, will take years to correct without a more stringent response from unified allies such as NATO and the EU. But, as I found talking to Kocijančič, huge strides are being taken and the pace is accelerating. Feeding into the discussion on the future direction of the European Union, the Commission held an orientation debate on the future of European defence on the 24th of May 2017.

  A stronger Europe when it comes to security and defence matters has been a priority for the Juncker Commission since it took office and President Juncker himself announced the creation of a European Defence Fund34 in his 2016 State of the Union address, saying “Europe can no longer afford to piggy-back on the military might of others...For European defence to be strong, the European defence industry needs to innovate.” With a worsening security situation, both traditional and hybrid, in Europe's neighbourhood, and a strong economic case for greater cooperation on defence spending amongst EU countries, the Commission said it believed “now is the time to make strides towards a Security and Defence Union.”

  The May 2017 orientation debate aimed to help guide the Commission's work in “the weeks to come,” rather than months or years, and ahead of the Prague high-level European conference on defence and security, in June 2017, the Commission was already set to launch the European Defence Fund – which was announced in the European Defence Action Plan of November 2016. “In parallel,” the Commissions said, “it will present a longer-term reflection paper setting out possible scenarios for the future in the area of European defence.” It’s clear the EU is trying to balance the introduction of these necessary defence measures with the economics of diverse states.

  Vice-President for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness Jyrki Katainen made a statement on the announcement, saying: “Strengthening European security and defence requires using the available defence budgets more efficiently. Investment in defence capabilities remains in the hands of the Member States, and the EU budget cannot replace the Member States' on defence. However, there is an overwhelming economic and industrial case for greater cooperation, for example in defence research and procurement. As pressure on national budgets remains high, we need more efficient defence spending and a better use of defence capabilities.”

  There is clearly a strong case for greater cooperation on security and defence across the union, and it, like NATO, is cognisant of the fact the threats faced by the EU as a bloc do not respect national borders. “Their scale is increasing. They are best tackled by working together,” the Commission said, adding: “A strong European defence requires a strong European defence industry. As Member States begin to increase their defence budgets, the EU can help them to spend these funds more efficiently. The lack of cooperation between the Member States in the field of defence and security is estimated to cost annually between €25 billion and €100 billion. 80% of procurement and more than 90% of Research and Technology are run on a national basis Up to 30% of annual defence expenditures could be saved through pooling of procurement.” The argument they make is well-grounded and dispassionate, which strikes me as being a carefully worded approach to drawing the states together on non-controversial grounds of basic finance. This, I believe, makes a more palatable argument for member representatives to take back to their own parliaments and electorates. It’s rather shrewd and certainly savvy, in my opinion.

  The softly-softly approach has, however, been taken by Juncker from the outset. In his political guidelines in June 2014, he stated: “I believe that we need to work on a stronger Europe when it comes to security and defence matters. Yes, Europe is chiefly a ‘soft power'. But even the strongest soft powers cannot make do in the long run without at least some integrated defence capacities.”

  When Juncker announced the creation of a European Defence Fund in 2016, the leaders of all but one member state concluded that “we need the EU not only to guarantee peace and democracy but also the security of our people.” In a challenging geopolitical environment, they agreed on the need to strengthen EU cooperation on external security and defence, a move which was opposed and frustrated only by Britain – who had already voted to leave the union in the Brexit referendum. “There are member states who would like to see...a single set of forces. That looks and sounds to me like a European army, and we would oppose that,” said Michael Fallon, Britain’s defence secretary.

  Despite the protestations of the inexplicably obstructive departing nation, on the 30th of November 2016 the Commission presented the European Defence Action Plan which outlined how a European Defence Fund and other actions could support Member States' more efficient spending in joint defence capabilities, strengthen European citizens' security and foster a competitive and innovative industrial base. The initiative was welcomed by EU leaders during the European Council meetings – in both December 2016 and March 2017 – and the Commission was given the mandate to present proposals before the summer of 2017. Britain’s principle objection, cited by Fallon, was that a common EU defence programme would detract from NATO. He was wrong and his obstruction unfounded.

  The European Defence Action Plan is part of the broader Defence package agreed to by the twenty-seven members in Bratislava. It was, the Commission said: “Complementary to the other two work strands, namely the Global Strategy's Implementation Plan on Security and Defence,” which sets out a new level of ambition for the Union and identifies actions to fulfil it, as well as with the implementation of the EU-NATO Joint Declaration signed by the President of the European Council, the President of the Commission and the Secretary-General of NATO. According to the EU and NATO, the joint declaration includes action on “hybrid threats, which is also linked to the April 2016 Joint Framework to counter hybrid threats, which in turn builds on the European Agenda on Security adopted by the Commission in April 2015.” Further, the Rome Declaration, adopted by the remaining twenty-seven EU leaders on the 25th of March 2017, pledged to work towards an “EU27 that helps create a more competitive and integrated defence industry, and which strengthens its common security and defence in cooperation and complementarity with NATO.”

  An additional white paper on the “Future of Europe” was presented on the 1st of March 2017 and set out the main challenges and opportunities for Europe in the coming decade. Its publication marked the beginning of a process for the EU27 to decide on the future of their Union without Britain.

  Even when the Rome treaty was being signed I was not aware of any of this. In fact, up until I visited Malmö, I had no idea about Capstone, STRATCOM, or the joint declaration. None of it. This all began for me with a trip to Sweden, to find out the truth about crime and immigration after a ding-dong with the alt-right on Twitter and that initial investigation opened a door which led me to connect the far-right across Europe to both the American alt-right movement and to Russia. From there I discovered all manner of darkness from Trump to Brexit, and beyond.

  If you’d asked me even earlier this year if we were at war, I’d have probably told you I thought one was coming; that I could see the troop movements on Europe’s Eastern borders escalating into armed skirmishes. But the idea a war had already started? The suggestion of a hybrid conflict? I’d have probably laughed.

  I don’t find it so funny now. The Alternative War is quite real.

  Three:

  On the 18th of February 2016 news reports of a bomb being thrown into the Turkish Cultural Centre in Fittja35, a Stockholm district, reached the headlines across the wor
ld. This followed Kurdish protests during Turkey’s military intervention in Syria. Code-named by the Turkish military as Operation Euphrates Shield, the cross-border operation of Turkish forces was allied with opposition factions in the Syrian Civil War. The offensive ended in a Turkish occupation of northern Syria and the action, which is thought to have been planned for up to a year beforehand, ended up creating conflict with the United States, a NATO ally. The extent of the deployment ran from the east, by the Euphrates river, to western, rebel-held area surrounding Azaz. The Turkish-allied Syrian forces had been fighting against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), as well as opposing the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The operation concluded in March 2017 and was hailed as a success by Turkey’s government. The building in Fittja was damaged in the protest against Euphrates Shield but nobody was injured.

  In October 2016, a Muslim community centre was fire-bombed in Malmö, causing smoke damage to the building and no injuries. Responsibility was claimed by ISIS according to local reports and a Syrian man was put on trial, but the courts found him not guilty in April 2017. The prosecutor submitted arguments the fire was “started in order to spread fear in the name of Isis,” and set out the cost to repair the smoke damage of one million Swedish kronor (about £100,000). The prosecutor also asserted the Polisen, on searching the suspect’s computer, discovered a description of how to make a detonator along with propaganda films showing ISIS soldiers fighting and killing “infidels.” He also reported the incident to the Isis-controlled news agency Aamaq, which is where the responsibility claim originated. However, Malmö District Court dismissed the terror charges, with Judge Lennart Strinäs recording36 that: “One of the prerequisites to consider the fire in question as a terror offence is that the act could have seriously damaged the state of Sweden. For that, acts of a completely different and much more serious nature are required and according to the district court that has not been the case. The act should instead be classified as arson.”